While the awesomeness that is Shaun wasn’t here stateside, he was teaching choreographing Jiyong’show to dance. That awesome choreography and the “running man” that me and my friend’s always do when came from no one other than the man himself, Shaun Evaristo.

Recently I was in korea working on GD’s debut. I didn’t get to stay for the making of this shoot so i was pretty excited to see the outcome. I heard all the ideas before hand and so it turned out great. I like the way he kinda just thinks about stuff and goes for it, I’m sure thats a big part of why he’s successful. The dancing was dope! Wish I was on set to guide the movement and fix a couple details but it looks like they got it covered.

Liked the costumes,Iidon’t know if the masks were GD face because I think they were originally supposed to be, but to me the white washes it out so I can’t tell. Looks a little jabba to me, but that wasn’t their original intent so no need to get that mixed up, hey I just do the choreography. lol. Anyway, I’m glad he was happy with the work, and working with him was a pleasure.

Right-o Shaun! You know the funny part, I told my friends, “Dude Jabba much?” But its ok! I still love your work. I do like the choreo though, you’re stuff work is so tight.

You also know my friend’s cousin, Alvin, but yeah another time. Come and choreo for my crew N3RD COR3. No Jabba though and make it hotter than GD’s ok?

The owner’s of Flo rida’s “Right Round” and Oasis’ “She’s electric” have made some statements regarding G-Dragon‘s supposed plagiarism.

They stated, “The 10 composers to ‘Right Round’ have not all expressed their opinion on this issue until. We had sent samples of GDragon’s songs to the parties involved for the 2 songs ‘Right Round’ and ‘She’s Electric.” Also, “There are indeed similarities between ‘Heartbreaker’ and ‘Right Round’ and between ‘Butterfly’ and ‘She’s Electric’. It is hard to say if it is plagiarism at this stage. We will all go with the final decision of the composers to the song.”*

Sony ATV commented that, “Sampling and remaking of a song by using part of the original should be allowed; but sampling without permission is not. The individual should try his/her best to make their own music/work every-time, so as to protect the copyright of others’ works. The piece of work should be the creator’s own expression and not just the idea or title.”*

All that means is that they should just use the original as inspiration. They do have a point though with the following trend. Many artists recycle beats, if they really want to get into it, they should come back to America and sue half of the artists now because at least 75% of the music has recycled beats. I can’t even begin to tell you how many songs I’ve heard on the radio and thought it was one song but in fact it was another.

“Also there is this thing about following trend. There may be cases when people or music experts will listen to a song A and think that it plagiarises song B, but that is because listening to it makes one think about the special characteristics of song B.”*

If they’re going to say that G-Dragon plagiarized, then Teddy, GD and who ever worked on Big Bang‘s HaruHaru, Lies and Heaven needs to get on LMFAO butt for literally taking those songs and re-making it into “La La La“. If any of you who listen to that song and don’t hear Big Bang, you need to clean your ears.

About GD‘s naked girl shirt, you go boy. Who cares if he has a shirt of a naked woman? He’s a grown man, of age and probably wants some of his own. He’s crying out for help; if wearing a naked woman on a shirt is as close as he’s gonna get to a naked woman right now, let the guy be please. K Thanks.

Everyone, try to be open minded. Anti’s try to get a life and stop meddling in the lives of people who you wish were friends with or jealous of. Karma sucks you know.

While G-Dragon dominates Korean music charts, Big Bang releases their album in Japan today (yesterday in Japan) and takes the 2nd and 6th place on Oricon charts.

I still stand by what I said before, it’s an okay album. I don’t feel it’s anything special. If anything GD’s album is better than this album; so if you’re going to spend money, spend it on the better and cheaper album. I mean really three songs are remakes and if you have the singles, you pretty much have 75% of the album.

If you’re in it for collection and goodies purposes then by all means. I can’t help but think that GD’s scandals are also the reason why they did so well in Japan. G-Dragon’s album was the number one pre-ordered album on HMV Japan, so how did Big Bang out do him?

This was so juicy it deserved it’s own post. For the first post go here.

“A person from VIPZ called Warner Chappell and Sony to confirm this for us; Warner Chappell and Sony both have not come in contact with any journalist or writer to publish this. Warner Chappell (who has the copyright for Right Round) said they are still doing meetings inside their company and THEY HAVE NOT EVEN SENT THE SONGS TO THE STATES YET. Sony(who has the distribution rights for She’s Electric) aren’t even taking this situation in consideration(they don’t think it’s a problem at all).

THUS ALL THE ARTICLES ABOUT PLAGIARISM AND ABOUT HOW THEY SENT IT TO THE STATES AND CONFIRMED IT IS ALL A LIE.

**Adding to that Warner Chappell nor Sony have made an ‘official’ stand on anything.

All the articles saying they have Warner Chappell’s or Sony’s official stand or side of the story is just a plain lie.”

credit: Beau@ygworld, bbvipz via bigbangvip

Now for the really juicy story behind it all:

The copyright owner to Flo Rida’s ‘Right Round’ has came out to confirmed that Big Bang GDragon’s solo debut song ‘HeartBreaker’ has committed plagiarism to the former.

Warner Korea, which is the publishing company to ‘Right Round’ in Korea, came out to say on 18th August, “The song ‘Heartbreaker’ which was revealed in full today has been confirmed to have plagiarised ‘Right Round’ by the composer. And the composer of ‘Right Round’ in America is in the dilemma of what to do and how to deal this case.”

It has been known that from the American side, they have already did an investigation of the whole song of ‘Heartbreaker’.

Warner Korea said, “The headquarters of Warner in Korea has already proposed the problem the American side with the judgement of the composer on the issue confirmed. But it is in the composer’s decision whether to give up on fighting for copyrights or to demand for a legal lawsuit.”

Here’s an article which came in after the above article (just to give more insights to the situation)

The company in Korea which holds 50% to the copyrights to ‘Right Round’ with Warner said in an interview on 18th August, “If we look at the song as a whole, we do not think that ‘Heartbreaker’ plagiarised that of ‘Right Round’.”

The person in charge said, “We do not know if there is a part to the rap which sounds similar, and the climax and highlight to the song is different also. Also the melody to the both songs are different.”

“With this reason, we cannot say that the song plagiarised that of ‘Heartbreaker’. There is so many cases of artistes getting inspiration from one another lately, If we are going to rule the song plagiarism just because it has some parts which feels the same, then many artistes and producers will fall into serious censorship.”

The person continued, “Whether the song has committed plagiarism the final decision lies in the original composer. Before they confirm that, we cannot rule the song as plagiarism.”

It has been known that there are about 10 people who are in charge of the original composing and lyrics to ‘Right Round’. This will include the person who came out with idea of the rap, the person who wrote the rap, the different people who made the special melodies. (YGWorld; kbites)

Everything that YG has said is “false”, can we still call it damage control at this point? Well yes we can. I said it in the previous post, he recycled beats, and even though the rap part in the beginning is exactly like Flo rida’s, I don’t think he plagiarized anything.

With his new album released, G-Dragon managed to steal 9 of top 10 spots on Korea’s top ranking charts. All but one song, “Korean Dream (feat. Taeyang)” ranked number 11. You’d think with Taeyang and it being called what it is, it would have ranked higher right? This new album has been the talk among fans everywhere, now will the sales be just as sweet as his smile?

Even though GD‘s managed to steal ten of the spots on the charts means nothing if sales are not as expected. Meaning, if they don’t outsell 2NE1‘s debut album, there is a problem. While many fans are encouraging others’ to purchase the album, how many of you actually did?

I said it before, all those accusations seem to have been a PR stunt set by the marketing department and/or GD himself. Don’t believe me? Look at the charts, he dominated the top 9 slots. Ever since he released the first 30 seconds of “HEARTBREAKER“, accusations have been said that GD plagerized Flo rida’s “Right Round“. Even though Warner Bros. dismissed it as plagerism, I do agree with them to a point. The fact that he used recycle beats is undeniable. Did he copy Flo rida? I don’t think so. I said it before and I’ll say it again, everyone uses recycled beats.

Truth be told I was a bit skeptical to listen to it when I got the cd. I actually waited to see what others would say, and it’s been nothing but praise so far. I finally listened to it and I actually like it.

“HEARTBREAKER” is diverse in its sounds, a rarity for solo albums. It was this missing diversity which made Big Bang‘s Japanese album a disappointment (if GD did any co-producing in that album). “A boy” is a typical GD song to be honest, its a very cliché song. We’ve all heard the tiny preview of “HEARTBREAKER“, after finally listening to the whole song, well there’s not much to say other than it sounds like what you heard. You’ll like it though, it’s catchy and a club tune, same goes for the song “Breathe“.

Now the song “Butterfly” did surprise me. He went acoustic and pulled it off well. It isn’t something I would have expected from him, but I wouldn’t put it past him either. Think of Jason Mraz and you’ll get what I’m saying. If you don’t, then just know this: it’s a song that if he did it all in English, it would be playing on U.S. radio stations. Out of all the songs, this falls into the adult contemporary genre.

If anything that made me laugh was the song, “The Leaders” featuring none other than other YG leaders, Teddy (1Tyme) and CL(2NE1). Why did this song make me smile and laugh? Upon hearing the preview from Big Bang TV, it reminded me of Snoop and Pharrell‘s “Drop it like its hot“. Don’t get me wrong, it still does. Hearing it whole and finalized brings me back to the old school hip hop tunes. CL is hot in the track, sorry GD, you were afraid she was going to be better than you and unfortunately for you, she is. My only concern here is, if fans are going to be bumping this song in L.A., don’t. You might get laughed at or shot, just kidding. Think thug music and that describes “The Leaders“. Which is ironic because none of the leaders are thugs.

Remember when Big Bang went rock with “Friend” and “Dirty Cash“? Remember when they failed at them too? Fortunately for GD he did right by the song, “She’s Gone“. The song, like “Butterfly“, is different from the rest of the album, adding flavor and style. While GD may not have the best ‘grunge’ type vocals, his attempt is commendable and not horrible. You can understand what he saying, which is a lot more than those who are in grunge rock bands and you can’t understand a thing they’re saying.

Through the net, non Big Bang fans have taken a liking to this album as well. Which is a good thing, because it will open them up to listen to Big Bang. If you’re not familiar with G-Dragon‘s style, he is a very unique person, with a unique style and has flavor. Although his rapping still sounds the same in almost every song. What will you get in this album? You’ll get club/dance, pop, rock and acoustic in this album and they all fuse together like a Robek’s smoothie.

Three of eleven songs made this an ‘A’ album. While the other songs are typical GD and club type songs, the fact is he added flavor and did this album his way. It wasn’t made for him, he made it the way he wanted to. You can see his style is very diverse and is great at expressing himself through music.

It seems he made this album this way because he can’t fully express himself in Big Bang. Why? Because in Big Bang, he isn’t just writing for himself, he’s writing for 4 other people. When you have your own album, you have more freedom for creativity. While I wouldn’t call him a genius so much, he has major talent, a music prodigy.

The album cover is said be similar to Spiritulized‘s album, “Let it come down“, and the photoshoot concept to Lee JunKi‘s “JStyle” photoshoot.

Let the guy release an album in peace, please.

While I’m well aware that songs are copyrighted, but concepts are not. Well, not all anyways. Everyone gets inspiration from some where. It’s where creativity comes from, artists draw inspiration from every where. While the photo’s are very similar, the idea behind the photo’s may be different.

I kind of feel sorry for him, but I can’t help but think part of it is just a publicity stunt. I put nothing past management and their ability for marketing. No really, I don’t. Everything that’s happening around the release of his album is all well, planned, so it seems. Think what you want, that’s what the marketing team is for. G-Dragon is getting great publicity for an album that isn’t even released and for free. It makes the marketing department’s job a lot easier. Remember, bad publicity is still free publicity and is better than no publicity at all.

credit: sookyeong@kbites

While I’m at it, here’s the full song of “Gossip Man” and translated lyrics here.